Waste not, fertilize much

A compact recycler can turn last night's leftovers into tomorrow morning's plant food.

We weren’t the only ones jonesing after the inventions presented at last week’s Consumer Electronics Show from afar. The best of the best new tech were displayed on stalls on the Las Vegas showroom floor, and some of them were recognized by the conference as part of its Innovation Awards. Here, Stimulant looks at five new creations you should probably be aware of for your next water cooler talk or, better yet, brainstorm/pitch meeting.

Maybe you already have a compact steel barrel sitting on your kitchen counter at home, collecting the food scraps from last night’s meal, or this morning’s breakfast. For some of us, that’s enough to feel like we’re offsetting some of the 300 pounds of garbage an average household clocks in each year. But for others (probably those who’ve also got a composting lavatory throne or two in their home), there’s still a desire to take it a step further.

Enter the Zera Food Recycler, a bin that’s about the size of a garbage can, but which does so much more, turning 300 pounds of food into zero pounds of waste. Every morsel of food that goes into the bin during the day is converted into fertilizer — and all within 24 hours. We see more than just savings on plant food: we see the end of smelly, sweaty compost bags making us gag every time we lose the spouse battle for who has to discard it.